Favourite Girls Names

Emma has now been among the top girl names in the United States for several years, claiming the Number 1 crown in 2008 and again from 2015 to 2018 before dropping back to second place.

Like Ashley before it, on-trend Everly has been followed by a range of spelling variants, and among them, Everleigh is the most popular.

Fiona entered the American consciousness with the opening of the 1954 Broadway musical Brigadoon, but didn't come onto the U.S. popularity list until 1990.

Floral, bright, and subtly powerful, Gaia is a name with two separate origins. In Greek mythology, it is the name of the earth goddess and the universal mother, who takes her epithet from the Ancient Greek word for land or ground. It was this ecological element that led actress Emma Thompson to choose it for her daughter back in 1999, and it could hold similar appeal to green minded parents today.

Originally a unisex nickname for a redhead -- red hair is called "ginger" in Britain -- or for the name Virginia, Ginger perennially wears pink gingham and spike heels.

Gwendolen, an ancient Welsh favorite, retired decades ago in favor of the short form Gwen, but now, as in the case all across the naming board, the nickname has faded and the more distinguished original is up for reappraisal.

This suffix is used as an independent name, but doesn't your little girl deserve more?

Indie is an independent-sounding nickname name that is in the Top 100 in Wales. As a diminutive, it's growing in popularity -- along with indie films, indie publishing -- and the reason some parents are choosing names like India and Indigo. The Indie version seems more feminine, while Indy as in Indiana Jones tends toward the boyish.

Ing was a powerful Norse god whose name inspired several modern variations -- though Inga has become a caricatured Scandinavian choice.

Io may be one of the slightest names in the book, but there aren't many two-letter names with as much substance as this Greek mythological example. Io, a name used for the largest moon of Jupiter, was in classic myth raped by Zeus and escaped from him by changing herself into a cow.

Serene Irene, the name of the Greek goddess of peace and one of the most familiar Greek goddess names, was hugely popular in ancient Rome and again in the United States a hundred years ago.

A Top 200 choice in the US from the late 1880s to the early 1930s, Irma has nevertheless fallen out of favor with modern parents, and doesn't look set for the sort of comeback that some of her vintage sisters have enjoyed in recent years. The devastating hurricane which hit the Caribbean Islands and the south-east coast of the US in 2017 has no doubt dealt its chances of revival a further blow.

For a long time, Isadora has been overlooked in favor of Isabella, owing perhaps to its association with the tragic modern dancer, Isadora Duncan, or because parents would rather their daughter be a Bella than a Dora. Now, with Theodora back in the charts and vintage names in vogue, Isadora has been slowly gaining more attention over the last decade.

Now that Jacob has been the top boys' name for several years, this may come to the fore, the way Michaela did after Michael's long reign at Number One. For now, it's one of the more unusual girl names starting with J.

No, we don't consider Jane too plain. In fact, for a venerable and short one-syllable name, we think it packs a surprising amount of punch, as compared to the related Jean and Joan.

This spelling of Jillian is now much more popular than the original, maybe because the G version invites pronunciation problems.

Josephine, with its large measure of class and character and a gently offbeat quality, has been on a gentle uphill climb in the US for over 30 years, now ranking in the Top 100. With an intriguing number of vivacious nicknames, from Jo to Josie to Fifi to Posy, Josephine is a Nameberry favorite.

June, a sweetly old-fashioned month name derived from the goddess Juno, was long locked in a time capsule with June Allyson (born Ella) and June Cleaver, but is rising again especially as a middle name.

Kate, in the headlines via Catherine Middleton aka the Princess of Wales, has been as pervasive as Kathy was in the 1950s and 1960s, both as a nickname for Katherine and Kaitlyn and as a strong, classic stand-alone name.